[Chicago.CBSLocal] An Illinois State Senator running to replace Jesse Jackson Jr. in Congress was incarcerated... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... Wednesday morning after he allegedly tried to bring a gun onto a plane at O'Hare International Airport."Psst! Phyllis!"
"Yes, Shirley?"
"That man in row six! He's heeled!"
"Hmmm... Looks like some sort of politician to me! We better call airport security!"
Sen. Donne Trotter (D-Chicago) was charged with a felony count of attempting to board an aircraft with a weapon, "Drop the rod and step away witcher hands up, yer honor!"
according to the Cook County State's Attorney's office. The charge carries a penalty of 1 to 3 years in jail."One to three years in jail? Tut tut, my good man! Do you know who I am?"
"Okay. Six to twelve, then!"
A police spokeswoman said Trotter is licensed to carry a weapon and has a valid Firearm Owner's Identification card.... but he's not a federal marshal...
The TSA said the gun was loaded with seven rounds, but there was not a round in the gun's chamber.Oh, well. That's a relief.I didn't need the 'D' after his name to know which party...

#3
he had the gun because he moonlights at Allpoints Security and Detective Inc.
A State Senator has to moonlight as a security guard? He's not much of a Illinois politician if he can't support himself with graft.

#4
Thought it was legal to carry a gun on a plane so long as it was declared at the check-in desk, unloaded, the empty magazine was dropped from the firearm, the ammo was stored separately in its own box, and the firearm was in a locked hard case. Most airlines have firearms transport policies listed at their website. It is very important to check and see what the local regulations are where you take-off and where you land. I'm not sure I'd do this these days as I would fear losing it in baggage transit.

#7
John,
You can check guns in the manner you explain, but not carry them onto the plane. Your correct on the second part as well. A layover or cancelled flight in New York after you checked a gun can be a real problem, actually a felony.

[CNBC] Treasury Secretary Timothy Geither told CNBC Wednesday that Republicans are "making a little bit of progress" in "fiscal cliff" talks but said the B.O. regime was "absolutely" ready to go over the cliff if the GOP doesn't agree to raise tax rates on the wealthy.

"I think they're making a little bit of progress," Geithner said. "They're clearly moving and figuring out how to try to move further."

But Geithner said the White House would "absolutely" go over the fiscal cliff -- triggering over $600 billion in automatic spending cuts and tax increases -- unless tax rates increase on the top 2 percent of wage earners.

"What we're trying to do is put in place a comprehensive, balanced set of fiscal reforms that put us back on the path of living within our means," Geithner told "Closing Bell."

Geithner, who is the B.O. regime's lead negotiator in the cliff talks, added that if Republicans are willing to accept higher rates, "we think we can do something really good for the economy. We can make the government use the taxpayers money much more efficiently, lock in some spending savings and do some long-term reforms to entitlements."

President Barack ObamaThe Cambridge police acted stupidly... told business leaders earlier in the day that a deal could be reached in a week if Republicans would accept higher tax rates on the wealthiest Americans.

#2
The Republicans need to make their case to the American people. maybe a prime time speech or full page ad outlining the economic consequences of over taxing the producers who already pay more than their 'fair share'.
That way when/if it happens, Obama & the dem socialists are squarely the one to blame.

#5
If the government took all of Bill Gates' and Warren Buffet's assets and earnings for the next ten years it would amount to roughly eight months of the interest on the debt. Not principal, interest.

A hundred years ago when a debt crisis also happened the richest man in the U.S. could have written a check from his personal finances to cover the entire debt.

Therefore, the only logical conclusion is that this current problem isn't about undertaxed wealthy people and it never was. This is about spending, spending. spending. It is about the size of the public sector workforce, and to a lesser extent about entitlements and welfare.

And while welfare and entitlements are a problem, there are far bigger ones.

The public sector workforce is simply too large. It needs to be cut by 40% or more. Summarily. In 1960 public sector employees comprised a mere 5% or so of the workforce. It is now 20% and rising. Here's the problem.

First, it needs to be pointed out always, that public sector employees pay no net income tax at whatever level of government they work. They are simply taking money from revenue and wealth that real earners and producers pay in taxes and leaving whatever their "tax" rate might be in the kitty. There are no new revenues in the government coffers generated by this.

In 1960, public workers earned less than the average private sector worker and so out of every twenty workers, one was public sector, two private sector workers' taxes were needed to pay for him/her, and the remaining taxes from the remaining seventeen workers paid for facilities, machinery, supplies, projects, pensions, etc. This is a manageable and sustainable system.

In 2012, the average public sector worker makes more than the average private sector worker, so it takes three of them for each public sector employee. But there are now four out of twenty who are public sector. So it takes twelve private workers' taxes to cover that. Leaving only four taxpayers to pay for facilities, machinery, supplies, projects, pensions, etc. Completely unsustainable, and the reason why the deficit and debt continue.

The only thing that will end this is a massive reduction in the pay grade of the public sector combined with massive layoffs of government workers. Period. You could tax people making over $250000 or $100000 or pretty much anything 100% and the problem of the deficit and debt will not go away. In essence, we imported an illegal workforce so that white and black Americans could move into high-paying government jobs and not have to take lower paying private sector ones. Deport the illegals, fire half the public workforce at all levels, and make them take the jobs that illegals have done for the past twenty of thirty years.

Their standard of living will fall, but...oh well. Karma's a bitch.

The current financial crisis cannot be fixed by increasing taxes and the Republicans shoudl agree to none until we have five to ten years of REAL cuts to get the infrastructure of government to a point where debt can be managed.

#7
Sending a needle-dicked tax cheat to negociate our taxes vs direct involvement himself, just another slap in the face by the Champ.

Throwing debt cap language in was a sure way to queer any negociation or deal. They know it, we know it. Why settle for increased taxes on the 1 or 2 percent when you can include ALL earners. They want the Bush tax cuts to end. No doubt about it.

#8
Taxes take money of value from the people. Inflation takes value of money from people. Both in the end are the same. Timmy has been raising taxes on people for over four years. We're already over the cliff. He wants an unlimited debt ceiling which basically gives the Executive/King unlimited power. He wants to take what remains of the republic over the cliff at the same time.

#9
Here's the thing. While many public sector workers are blithely ignorant of the math regarding what has to happen to fix this, many others, perhaps most, know it full well. They are simply trying to delay the inevitable as long as possible.

It is also clear at this point that many, perhaps most, of the people in the public sector work force have taken a scorched earth approach. If you were to tell them "Sorry, in order to save the republic you need to take a massive pay cut or lose your job and have to into the dreaded private sector"' they would reply, "F*** it, then, let the republic die, if I can't get my guaranteed public sector paycheck for doing my cushy job I'll just let the whole thing blow up."

These attitudes go a long way towards explaining, at least in part, the last election's results. These people are literally voting for their own economic lives without any consideration for the results on others. Economic concupiscience. It may not be "free" stuff but is perhaps discount stuff. No public employee, it seems, will ever understand the need to do something which diminishes their pay, even if reusing to do so destroys his neighbors, his town, or his nation.

#12
...but you notice, they always seem to be able to downsize Defense. We used to have an Army of over a million in the 70s, when the 'temporary' WoT authorized increase lapses, it'll be again below half of that, and probably smaller. On the other hand we do seem to have more general officers per enlisted than anytime on record.

Any increase in taxes on the wealthiest X% will be applied to all public employees as well, regardless of their pay grade and in addition to what they pay now. After all, shared sacrifice is the patriotic thing, isn't it? Those who pay zero percent now will go to whatever the difference is between what " the rich" pay now and what they will pay post fiscal cliff.

#14
no mo: i guess the $21,000+ my wife and i paid for taxes wasn't real? she is civil service (navy medicine) and part of my tax contribution was the mil retirement. and if she were no longer there, somebody would have to do the work, so there is still a cost.
how about you direct your argument toward the terminal welfare no-loads and illegals in the country that really siphon off $$ and contribute squat.

#15
Yeah, lets not let public sector psychosis set in, I'm a civilian federal employee too, an engineer, and you wont have a single scientist, engineer, doctor or any other professional in the federal service if the pay gets much worse. We pay far more for health insurance than when I was in the private sector, vacation time is about the same, life insurance is more expensive, TSP is a 401K type retirement that we pay into with a small matching from the govt, the FERS pension plan is a dog and at 1% per year you aren't getting rich quick. All in all the pay is already sub-par, even at GS-13, and the pension would leave you eating cat food when you were old if you don't put into the TSP with your own 10-15% of your own pay, the environment vis-a-vis management is totally toxic and adversarial. Combine that with shitty dingy old offices and a campaign of denigration and half-truths by the trunks in the last election and you have one hell of a job.
That isn't even figuring in the 2-1/2 year pay freeze, that is what it is.
Some people on the bottom, GS-6 and below are overpaid compared to their private sector counterparts, but we are talking about people making $32,000 a year instead of the $27,000 a year they should be.
You gonna close the deficit with that money No Mo Uro?

#16
I intended to say, before I read the comments to this thread, that going over the cliff would be what the Dems would want, double the cuts to DOD over the next 10 years and Tax increases on every American.
Have the Pubs really thought this through? They should have some sort of "game plan" I would think.

Ever heard of NASA?
Know what a RIF is?
Layoffs are common, we call them Furloughs, I was "furloughed" last year for several weeks.

You wanna be a govt scientist or engineer?
Then go get an engineering degree, get on USAjobs.gov and find a f*cking govt job. But don't make sh*t up about there being no govt employees laid off. And you might be interested to know that the engineering field, in general (all disciplines) has very low unemployment
in the private sector, ~4% last time I looked.

#19
Doesn't make much difference. One day, not too long out, the money runs out either physically or virtually as what they print won't be worth much. A lot of government employees are going to join those marchers in Greece. Something has to give. Somehow we survived as a nation in the 50s, 60s, and 70s without a lot of departments and bureaus we have today. We will again when financial reality bites big time.

It isn't that you and your wife didn't have that money to spend. I concede that that is the case.

The point is that your "taxes" aren't new revenue and wealth that was generated. Your pay came from money that was already taken from produced wealth. Your taxes were not addtional moneys generated by addtional wealth created in the form of goods and services. So, mathematically speaking, there is no net gain to the government coffers.

To illustrate....if there are ten thousand taxpayers (private sector) in your town paying the local income tax of 5% and they average $50000 in pay the total receipts from their taxes are 25 million. Out of that money comes the salaries of the town workers. Assuming the town doesn't pay out more than the taxes collected, no matter how much tax the town workers pay, the total receipts that the town has in its account will never exceed 25 million, because after the town employees receive their checks, the net result will be a balance of some number less than 25 million. No matter how much they put back in taxes, even if it were 100 %', you'll never add to that number.

I'm not trying to comment on the value of their work, or of the necessity for some sort of public sector presence, although I am certainly within my right to critique laziness, waste, and corruption when it occurs. I am grateful for your sacrifice in the military, USNRet, and it is people like you who illustrate the need for a good public sector and its employees. The fact of the matter is that mathematically speaking the "taxes" paid by public employees are not a net addition to the total revenue collected and ultimately spent by the government. They do not enhance or enlarge the revenue stream of total tax revenue. The mathematical truth is that public employees take some of the money siphoned off from the productive sector of society and put a small piece of it back. It's not a value judgement, it's just stating the obvious.

I'm not bashing anyone, this isn't "psychosis" (way, way over the top, Big Jim, and inappropriate). I recognize the problems that we face with the perpetual welfare class who are, as you pointed out USNRet, a huge drag. But if you look at the numbers, you cannot escape the truth. 20% of the workforce being public sector is unsustainable at current pay levels, 10% might even be too much, but lowering it to that level would be a step in the right direction. Perhaps a combination of personnel cuts and pay level cuts (to bring things back to the intended levels of the original social contract between public and private sectors) would work. Good luck, though, trying to find a single public employee at any level of government who would be willing to give up a dime to share in the sacrifice and hurt the private sector has sustained (although they sure love sharing in the good times).

Getting all the unproductive welfare cheats off the dole would be a big help but it would be a one-time savings and still would not address the public employment problem.

The problem is that nobody who is getting that guaranteed government check will ever willingly give it up or even make an effort at trying to understand the basic accounting facts I've laid out in this post and my previous ones. Some of the responses here are object proof of that.

A big part Obama's base's enthusiasm right now is people who are conservative in all other respects but are loath to give up the guaranteed government check and so they vote for whichever candidate they perceive will be least likely to reform the size and cost of the public workforce. "Please, just put it off until I can get the pension!". They are organized, they have unions and clout with politicians, so the problem does not get solved.

#15

Your invective seems to indicate that you personalize what was never intended that way. That speaks volumes, really.

Also, I think you confuse the word "denigrate" with "describe".

While your individual situation is interesting, you cannot form policy based on anecdotes. Math conquers all, and that which cannot be sustained will not.

Oh, and by the way, there will always be people to take those jobs, no matter how bad you seem to think the compensation package is. They will be people who don't have the ability to deal with the anxiety of metrics and the possibility of losing their income stream, and people who didn't qualify for better private sector jobs and have no other choice. I am weary of public sector types who rant about how much more they would be making if they had a private job. Go do it, then. But they either can't get hired there, or are afraid to lose the security blanket of the guaranteed check from Mama government. Perhaps not you, individually, Big Jim, are like that. But to deny this dynamic ignores reality.

#19

Good for you for your clear truth-telling. I am sick to death of being told how much every public employee is so essential to the fabric of the nation that to do without will mean the end of the universe.

#22
If an agreement can't be reached, automatic spending cuts and taxes go into effect and that is the fiscal cliff? And this is done to stay under the debt ceiling and prevent a downgrading. This problem has been a long-time in the making and Obama has aggravated the problem with wanton spending--in part to get votes.

The bailouts have been shifted to the taxpayer so we all pay. A Detroit council woman has asked for some of the federal bacon for a bailout. California has asked for a bailout. Out tax money goes to pay for these cities and states who have management problems. Some of the problems have been caused by industry flight to other states and with this flight goes the tax base. Over-regulation and its costs has caused some of this flight. Public unions have driven up the costs to taxpayers. Unethical politicians who have promised everything to everybody for votes is another problem. Unless these problems are addressed we are going we are going to drive over some fiscal repeatedly and the State and Federal levels. Interestingly, it is blue states that seem to be having the problems.

#23
Well then you are in luck. 40% of the federal workforce is eligible to retire in the next 5 years. After the whipping they have taken, and I'm not just talking pay freeze, over the last few years I'd say many/most will retire as soon as they can. It will be extremely hard if not impossible to hire, train and deploy replacements for all these people. Add to that the wars in the ME coming to an end and you will have a very large drop in the headcount by the next decade. Way more than the 5% we are going to get with sequestration-which we fully expect to happen.
The downside to that is services YOU like will no doubt be cut or impaired as well. VA, SSA, USPS, DOT, CDC, will still be getting your tax money but not providing the services you are accustomed to. If they chopped off half the federal govt workforce do you really think they would lower your taxes?

#24
bigjim-Cal: Those things will happen. We have lived with what you describe at the state level for years: pay and hiring freezes, cutbacks in programs and agencies, etc. We are a right-to-work state and presently fairly well managed. We have a balance budget requirement that has to be met at the end of each fiscal year. We took a hit and went into the red with TennCare--our experiment with state-provided health care for the poor. Our qualification requirements were low and as the result people were moving here to obtain health care for chronic and serious health conditions. Some of them were desperate because it involve their children who had serious health problems. TennCare was tightened up and reformed and the care is provided but it is not as widespread or extensive. We are now grappling with what to do about ObamaCare. We have a high sales tax but no income tax. We have a dividend tax which amounts to an state income tax for retirees although the phrase "income tax is avoided" with regards to these dividends. I suppose more belt-tightening is in the works for all of us. Washington has to get its fiscal act together. D.C. acts like a pubescent teenager with an unlimited credit card.

"The downside to that is services YOU like will no doubt be cut or impaired as well. VA, SSA, USPS, DOT, CDC, will still be getting your tax money but not providing the services you are accustomed to. If they chopped off half the federal govt workforce do you really think they would lower your taxes?"

In a word, yes.

I could get by easily with Dept. of Education, EPA, much of what DOT does, etc. Much of what the CDC and FDA and Dept. of Agriculture do could be privatized or moved to the states. The USPS should be cut back to an agency which delivers a few sizes of letters and nothing else, private companies can do packages and books and the internet exists for catalogues.

And the remaining alphabet agencies all undoubtedly could use a haircut.

Furthermore, if you cut half the jobs, how could these organizations justify continued receipt of the same amount of money? Imagine....

"Yes, Senator, we only have 50% of the employees we did two years ago, but we want the same amount budgeted for payroll".

Yeah, that'll work. Even the lefties in the MSM won't stand for that crap.

Oh, and thanks, Big Jim, for proving me right about another thing. When faced with the prospect of any sort of anxiety regarding the magic checks, the public employee's first reflex is to threaten the citizenry with hell fire and damnation and loss of services without which we shall simply perish. This dictionary definition officiousness. Your post is basically saying, "Pay us whatever we ask, or we'll take away all the stuff you like using in government".

That's extortion, plain and simple. It's like the town government that never even considers cutting workers' salaries but immediately cuts the hours of the youth center or library whenever they don't get a budget increase passed.

When that 40% retires, simply don't replace them. Make the existing workers continue to do the work of the agency. Go home tired, and all that. Like I do. If they can't fire them and find people who can.

If they don't like it they can leave and go to the dreaded private sector.

Oh yeah, that dreaded part...I guess they won't leave, after all.

Another alternative is to give up some compensation to keep the same workforce size.

#27
So no mo, to use your logic about "new wealth," all public job holders should go home. Who would answer the call when your house was on fire? Not the parasitic firemen to use your logic. Try again and this time lose your public sector job bias. If you can see around your union logo.

#28
no mo uro, it's that you're painting with an overly broad brush. To give another example, art. I, sec. 8, cl. 8 of the Constitution authorizes the federal government to grant property rights (patents) to inventors. There are several thousand of us grunts (patent examiners) whose sole responsibility is to make that decision.

Exclusive property rights are wealth, which need both an inventor to invent and a government to recognize and protect. Same reason no one minds paying for police and firemen and the military.

(As a bonus, the patent office is funded solely by fees paid by applicants. We don't spend a dime of taxpayer money; on the contrary, Congress takes money from us. We bring in about $2.6 billion/year. Congress lets us keep about $2.2 billion of it. Believe me, I'm pissed.)

What's offensive to me and USN and bigjim, I believe, is that the work of a substantial number of government employees has a direct nexus to wealth creation and wealth protection. Yet generalizing as you have lumps us in with the loafers, parasites, and busybodies that we have an equally strong interest in getting rid of. The challenge is, how do you treat the cancer without killing the patient? You seem to be saying, chop the patient in half, but that won't really accomplish either goal. Making finer distinctions I think is all we're asking.

#29
The creativity of the private sector clearly funds the patent office jobs. Therefore it is not a tax burden.

Many of the Federal engineering jobs are funded by project bonds approved and paid for by the local tax payer, bonds approved in local elections.

NASA generates new sciences that in a round about way boosts revenue by private sector applications that in turn create jobs that in turn pay IRS taxes.

What Uro and many people are pissed off at are the new government sector Empire Builders who collect 6 figure salaries, payoff entitlement blood ticks to vote for thier enabler politicos, who irresponsibly blow trillions of dollars which destroys the private sector, then demand more loot from private sector paychecks.

Now a question for the public sector commenters who are retired are plan to retire ASAP. What makes you think you will see a decent retirement return on your life's public sector work in 10 years when both private sector and public sector coffers will be beyond empty/broke by these top level oublic sector barn rats (beaurocrats) eating all the grain in the barn and then some?

#30
Unfortunately, when the money isn't there, we will have to give up government services and the people who provide them.

RandomJD, your section of the government is relatively small and generates a positive cash flow, so you'll probably be ok. There are those calling for shortening patent times to the original 28 years, if I understand correctly, but nonetheless, that shouldn't significantly impact your area's workload. My personal feeling is that y'all should be upsized a bit to shorten turnaround time, given how inventive Americans are and how that should positively impact the economy.

USN, ret, you know that police and fire protection are local, not federal responsibilities. You must, because even I know that. (The feds have the FBI and the Secret Service and Homeland Security and the marshals, etc. I wouldn't protest if Homeland Security was shut down as a cost savings, would you?). Cutting spending/staffing at the federal level will have no impact on police and firefighters whatsoever. In fact, there are many, like Rantburg's own swksvolFF whose gear is paid for by pancake breakfasts, and whose staff are entirely volunteers, so we know what it looks like when the community can't/won't pay... and there are communities in New Jersey and California who've shut down their police forces, so we know exactly what that looks like when the community can't pay (get good locks for your doors and windows, stock up on ammunition, and pray -- hard).

And yes, people will whine when they can't get the services they're accustomed to. But what we can't afford, we'll have to learn to live without. After all, Mr. Wife, after taking on the workload of 1.5 others due to downsizing in his division (and it started out as a 65 hr/week job -- he became really, really efficient) ended up downsizing his own job in order to keep on two of his people. Fortunately, he was picked up by another part of the company, but "right-sizing" has been the reality in the private sector for a good portion of Mr. Wife's career; he's paid attention to his personal job market since the late 80s out of necessity.

#31
Nb: while our insurance and health care costs have gone up significantly, in the last decade Mr. Wife's paycheck went from mostly base salary plus a small bonus to a small base salary with both bonus and the rest of his salary tied to the company's profits that year. This is what middle management looks like in a Fortune 500 company nowadays. For perspective, Mr. Wife is a chemical engineer by training and a research scientist by initial inclination, not a high flying commissioned sales type.

#32
When the entitled elect themselves, the party continues and the coming hangover gets that much bigger.
Greece was able to keep the party going for more than 10 years before the hangover hit. I don't think the US has that luxury. The EU looked after Greece but the US has only got China who can be a tyrannical nurse if she wants to be and the US is no position to object.
Bottom line the excess excrement has to be cleaned out before the patient can recover

#33
What Uro and many people are pissed off at are the new government sector Empire Builders who collect 6 figure salaries, payoff entitlement blood ticks to vote for thier enabler politicos, who irresponsibly blow trillions of dollars which destroys the private sector, then demand more loot from private sector paychecks.

Right on, Dino. Couldn't agree more.

Now a question for the public sector commenters who are retired are plan to retire ASAP. What makes you think you will see a decent retirement return on your life's public sector work in 10 years[?]

Well, I'm much further than that from retirement (under 40), and for me the answer is: Nothing. The "retire at 65" model was a fantasy. An illusion built on the credit boom, and those days are gone, private and public sector alike. bigjim is right about TSP, and who knows what a well-managed account will be worth in 25-30 years. A lot? Nothing? No way to predict.

So I live for the moment. I stay in my job because I enjoy it more than anything else out there. I stay fit and healthy because I think it's a sin to waste what God gave me. I'm a prepper and I'm armed to the teeth. I do the best I can with what I've got - today - and don't hope for more than a way to quietly OD when I'm old and crippled and there's no reason left to go on. It's horrible, but it's realistic.

Mainly, I hope being an outwardly compliant member of the Outer Party will allow me to take care of me and my family. I trust God to understand, and show me the righteous path. Not much else we can do.

#37
Thanks Barbara. This is not how I looked at things 10 years ago. The communists who tried to brainwash me in college robbed me of an education, and now they are robbing me of my country and all the hopes that went with it. A large majority of my peers did not understand my objections then, or now. There's no other way to say it: we're fucked.

All of us. Which is why an internecine private vs. public sector flame war is so stupid. We are Americans first, and we all want our Republic back. Easy for me to say because yeah, I know, not even Ron Paul would shut down the patent office. I guess my point is, let's keep our eye on the ball here. To quote an icon of my generation (Beavis), "things are going to suck more than they have ever sucked before." That's a given. The question is, what are we going to do about that?

#38
TW; yes i know my example was local, not federal, but our friend no mo is cutting a pretty big swath into the entire spectrum of public service and i suspect he would not give a tinker's dam about where the alleged savings came from. but if all currently public civil service jobs were outsourced to the private sector then that i think would be ok in his opinion.
also one thing nhe has failed to mention, and that is public service is the only job that pays part of its own salary through taxes.
if i could have gone tax free those 26 years and taken a 1 for 1 salary cut i would have. and just think, no mo would get his wish because then not so many public service folks would have been needed to shuffle paper.

his broadside, it appears hit more than just this old retired aeroplane wrencher.

#39
TW, thank you too. I'm trying to adjust to the new normal, without sounding fatalistic. It's true my little corner of the world will be ok, whatever happens. That's one reason I chose it. The number of old Chinese and Soviet and East German patents I come across doesn't surprise me so much anymore. You can't redistribute wealth without letting a few people create it.

Not to derail the thread onto patent stuff, but patent terms range from 17-20 years, depending on various factors. Last year, Ogabe signed into law the most enormous patent reform in the history of history. I would note, however, that it's been in the works for 10-15+ years, long before he was anyone, so whether it will be harmful or helpful remains to be seen. Our outgoing director agreed with you, and hired 2-3 thousand new examiners to reduce pendency. But it is a high-pressure job that requires a weird mix of skills so attrition is high. The pressure to issue patents has increased (meaning, the bar has been lowered), obviously a downstream response to a floundering economy. I.e., lots of garbage gets out the door now, that will be more susceptible to challenge and litgation and reversal. As ever, the lawyers will make out fine.

[San Francisco.CBSLocal] A ban on nudity in San Francisco was given final approval by the city's Board of Supervisors Tuesday in a raucous meeting at which several people stripped naked in board chambers.

The ordinance, which will prohibit nudity on city streets, sidewalks, plazas and other public spaces, was initially passed 6-5 during the board's Nov. 20 meeting and was approved again Tuesday afternoon by the same vote.

Supervisor Jane Kim initially gave the legislation a seventh vote of support but later rescinded her vote, saying she had been distracted and accidentally voted yes.

Supervisors John Avalos, David Campos, Eric Mar and Christina Olague were the other four supervisors to oppose the ban.

Several men and women stripped down after the first vote Tuesday afternoon and began yelling at the supervisors. They were led out of board chambers by sheriff's deputies, who draped blankets over them since public nudity is not allowed at City Hall.

#1
I read these articles and I think I am reading about an alternative universe. People in SF strip off their clothes in protest over everything. I'd say pics please but I have seen these before and it has taken a long time to erase them from memory.

SEN. RAND PAUL: I have yet another thought on how we can fix this. Why don't we let the Democrats pass whatever they want? If they are the party of higher taxes, all the Republicans vote present and let the Democrats raise taxes as high as they want to raise them, let Democrats in the Senate raise taxes, let the president sign it and then make them own the tax increase. And when the economy stalls, when the economy sputters, when people lose their jobs, they know which party to blame, the party of high taxes. Let's don't be the party of just almost as high taxes.

LARRY KUDLOW, CNBC: Some people have called that the doomsday scenario. Others have said, 'Look, it's a strategic retreat on the Republicans' behalf.' WWould you vote present for that in the Senate if that came up?

RAND PAUL: Yes, I don't think we have to in the Senate. In the House, they have to because the Democrats don't have the majority. In the Senate, I'm happy not to filibuster it, and I will announce tonight on your show that I will work with Harry Reid to let him pass his big old tax hike with a simple majority if that's what Harry Reid wants, because then they will become the party of high taxes and they can own it.

The MSM and WH will begin to blame the tax hikes all on the Pubs. The 'low information voters', plus the other usual entitlement subjects, will only see that the GOP raised taxes. The recollection of the actual guilty characters in this charade will quickly exit down the memory hole. Two years is a long time and rememberin' be tough.

#2
Because of the bias in reporting, the cliff will be the Republicans fault, and so would tax hikes.

The GOP gets screwed either way due to our press no longer being a reporting operation, but instead they have become an advocacy/propaganda operation. Sad to say, we are more likely to find critical truths in Pravda than we are in the NY Times and NBC News.

A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.